It isn’t an either/or Sir – Tom Burns (letter, June 25) is very precise in his judgement of exactly what is right and wrong in Margaret Coombs’s defence of Warneford Meadow. I should like to point out a fundamental error in what Professor Burns has to say on the matter.

It isn’t the sale of Warneford Meadow that would help vulnerable people. It is the provision of ‘high-quality and individualised accommodation’ that will help the ‘very ill patients’ he refers to.

We agree. But there is plenty of room for this on the Warneford Hospital site without building on the meadow. And why should provision of these facilities have to rely on selling land acquired 90 years ago that just happens to be available for sale at a profit now?

The mental health trust presents this as an either/or debate. Either sell the meadow or there won’t be any improvements to hospital facilities. Either you agree to sacrifice the meadow or you are heartlessly condemning ‘very ill patients’ and their families to suffer needlessly.

What would his argument be if there wasn’t a convenient potential windfall in the shape of a precious and well-loved open space at hand ready to be exploited for its development value?

We have a National Health Service: does Professor Burns seriously suggest that if another city needed its psychiatric facilities upgrading, but didn’t happen to own an asset such as the meadow, the Government would simply say “too bad!”. Isn’t it time for the trust to think about how both to secure the facilities the hospital presently lacks and retain a natural resource that has been prized by patients and hospital staff alike for nearly a century?

Andrew Carter Friends of Warneford Meadow